"Whoever doesn't acknowledge the reality of the state of teams isn't rational in analysing."
The above statement is how folks opened up a stinging attack on Arsenal after the Bournemouth loss last week. They continued by saying something like the following below—
You can't have the best squad by a country mile in the league and in Europe not meeting their targets especially when other teams are in this poor state.
The writing has been on the wall since, having only set-pieces as your only strategy is a risk. I can only blame Arteta...
He has been given every resource any manager can dream of having; fantastic players in every position, times two.
I won't absolve Arteta of blames, but then let me correct a certain impression of how fantastic the squad is.
Sometimes, things are said repeatedly that they become "true" based entirely on repetition.
Let's address a few of these "truths"
On the basis of raw talent, that's not true. Let's compare Arsenal and Man City. In the attacking department, can you name one Arsenal player that has played to the level of quality of players in the Man City attack this season? Even Gyokeres who came in on the back of so many goals from Portugal has not hit the ground running and in his entire career so far he hasn't being on the same level as Haaland. Therefore in terms of depth of quality, Man City has a better depth than Arsenal (thinking of depth of quality in terms of number of players X the peak performance at any point in their careers).
In the midfield, there are probably a few players who are comparable to Man City's in quality, namely Rice and Odegaard. Can you name any other? Arsenal has replacements but none comes in with the same quality as Declan Rice for example; he's not directly replaceable in the heart of the midfield. Then ofcourse, this seaaon given injuries Odegaard has been out of sorts.
In defence, I'd agree that Arsenal has a greater depth and possibly quality than Man City. That said, most of the defenders at Man City came in with greater hype and expectations compared to Arsenal's defenders. City keeps buying star defenders.
At the moment, I won't even rate Arsenal's defence as significantly superior to Man Utd's on the basis of raw talent (not based on the quality of what they have played). Man Utd has used its brand pull to acquire players like Leny Yoro, in direct competition with Real Madrid at a time when they were a much bigger force than they are now. How many defenders did Arsenal struggle with top teams for?
In further comparison with Man United, I don't rate any defensive midfielder in Arsenal this season, on the same level as Casemiro, and he's 33 or 34 now. In attack, Man Unitedd has players that will easily get into the first team of Arsenal.
Let's even look at Arsenal’s recruitment from Chelsea. Is it not rejects from Chelsea they have been acquiring? How many players that Chelsea deem important to them have crossed the divide to Arsenal? Have people forgotten how Arsenal fans were protesting the acquisition of Madueke from Arsenal? It's thesame thing they did when Kai Havertz moved. So it's not like Arsenal bought world super stars.
All that said, I agree that Arsenal has a good squad depth to expect an EPL title this season irrespective of not necessarily have the best players amongst top teams man-to-man.
Arsenal has scored over 100 goals this season in all competitions already with about up to 30% being from set-pieces. That's at least 70% not from set-pieces.
How does that relate to set-pieces as their only strategy?
Eventhough, it's likely they'll break the record, their current corner kick record is not stand alone in EPL history.
Let's move to the anatomy of their corner kicks, they, at least, have a fairly complex routine. I remember around 1998 and a few years after it when AC Milan was dependent on Oliver Bierhoff's headers from corners when they needed goals. They seemed to deliberately seek to earn a cornerkick in a hard match just to exploit it. And that was a great Mikan side then.
Arsenal has scored 18 goals roughly from corners, Man United have scored over 10 goals from corners this season already and hold the record of goals scored from corners, about 142. Is it then right to say that Man United had cornerkicks as their only strategy all those years of dominance?
I agree that questions should be asked of Arteta if Arsenal doesn't deliver the EPL at least this season( I support a sack even). However, the top quality football they have played in the last 2-3 seasons is an unambiguous display of Arteta's genius, independent of the raw quality of players.
Cheers
